The Adventure: June 27: Yellowstone: bald eagles!

Yellowstone Lake is immense. Absolutely immense. I thought Clear Lake was big!

We were on our way back to West Yellowstone to leave the park. There was a 1/4 mile stretch of road that was posted "no stopping" because of bald eagles nesting. We'd driven past this twice already but it wasn't til now that it was like "oh yeah, that huge nest up there in the tree!" So we pulled over past the closure and walked back (as far as allowed) to take some pics. It was impossible to get great shots considering the distance but nevertheless this is a bald eagle and its baby. Bryan was back there last weekend and said this chick has fledged. Cool!



I'd seen these eagles first thing that morning along the river near the West Entrance but told B not to stop because they were back pretty far from the road. Well, they probably weren't any farther away than this, but it's okay. There were a lot of animals we passed up that day (elk, bison) because of all the pics from the previous day. I occasionally found myself thinking "we should have stopped for that one" but realized later that if we had done one thing different that day and altered the schedule by even a few seconds we wouldn't have seen what we saw next. You'll see.... ;-)

Up next: the moment you've been waiting for! What we saw! (Yes, I have been dragging this out as long as possible) ;-)

July 12 work in progress

WIP:

CS and I went to see the Sex and the City movie late last night. It was good, I liked it, and it was fun to have a girls' night out on the town! I didn't follow the series (because we don't have cable) but that didn't really matter, I was still able to enjoy it. I am looking forward to the new X-Files movie! It has been FAR too long since I have been able to drool over Mulder.... ;-)

I delivered my art to State Fair this morning. I should find out about awards by early August, though I'd be pretty surprised if I get anything. I saw some really fantastic art there, and some stuff that made me think "I really don't understand art." I really don't. I understand my art, and art like mine, but some stuff, I just don't get it. State Fair has always been sort of a weird art show. I think it's tamed down quite a bit over the years, but there were times I'd look at it and just be totally disgusted by it because it's all this weird modern abstract political hoo ha, and maybe I'm just old fashioned but I like aesthetically pleasing art! Anyway, it's hugely competitive, so getting in there is always quite cool and surprises the heck out of me! They want me to be a docent, since I'm fairly local. Hmmm, do I want to do that? Could be neat. Or boring. I need to see if they reimburse gas money though.

After that, I dropped by the Pacific Flyway Decoy Association show. I'd seen a little ad for it at the frame shop last time I was there, otherwise I would not have known about this. I expected it to be a little thing but was totally surprised at what a big show it is and how many people were there. It didn't even dawn on me to take a camera. There were more decoys than I have ever seen, in lots of categories (ducks of course, shorebirds, birds of prey). Some were hunting decoys, some were decorative. There were quite a few artist booths with some really big name people there (duck stamp winners). Amazing stuff. I'd be half tempted to say I might want to show there but I'm pretty deficient in duck art. A non-hunter myself (I have no objection to it, just not something I'm interested in doing) I don't get out into duck-environments too often, or see wild waterfowl other than quite far away (with the exception of mallards), so I don't know the minute details of their feather patterns and whatnot. Perhaps I need a duck-blasting dude to bring me dead stuff to photograph. ;-) I'll add that to the list of qualifications, ha ha. Now if there was ever a chicken stamp competition, oh yeah baby, I'd be all over that one.

The air is getting better, hopefully it'll be decent enough to ride tomorrow. I need to move a bunch of birds around too. I've been thinking a lot about shows and chickens and what I'm going to do. I really would like to go to the National down in Ventura. It's a hugely long drive and I hate to do that because of gas prices, but there will be people there from all over and that's super fun. I could take the art probably pay for the whole trip, though it's a pain in the butt to deal with that and birds. Then again at that time of year I'm not likely to have many showable birds anyway. I'll have to give this some thought.

The Adventure: June 27: Yellowstone: falls and big bull elk!

We headed north from Norris Geyser Basin.

Here's a pretty scene overlooking a lot of trees. There were some discovery channel people down there filming some sort of interview so everyone was getting hushed by a ranger right here. You'd think they could go a little farther off the beaten path for that sort of thing. I guess if you ever see this interview and hear a loud truck in the background that will be B's claim to fame. ;-)

And here's a waterfall. I don't know what this is. My journal says we stopped at Tower Falls, so I'd have thought this is that, except in my photos this comes before Mammoth Hot Springs, and Tower Falls was after that according to the map, so.... essentially I have no idea. Maybe I didn't photograph Tower Falls, or maybe this is it. Or maybe I'm just totally confused. Yeah, that would be typical!

A scene from above whatever falls that was:

All along we'd been seeing a fair amount of female elk, most of which we did not stop for, having seen a lot on the 26th. And there was the occasional far-away group of little bachelors, but the big boys had been pretty elusive up til now. I think we actually stopped to get some scenery pics in this pretty valley and then realized there were two bull elk way the heck out there. Again, love this camera. I could not have gotten these shots with my little camera.

Pretty valley, can you see the two elk?



Uh oh, getting grumpy with eachother!



Interesting that the one on the left is ear tagged.

So northward we went from wherever this was and stopped at Mammoth Hot Springs for lunch. What a zoo, there were a ton of people there. Did not walk around the hot springs itself, just did a drive-by photo on the way out. I don't know what that odd geological formation there in the foreground is, and I shall also refrain from mentioning what we called it.

Next we stopped at Lower Yellowstone Falls and went to a place called Artist Point. Wow yeah, gorgeous. If it wasn't for the gazillions of tourists, I could have stood there and stared at this place for a long time!




A sleepy bull elk by the side of the road on the way out.

Next stop: Yellowstone Lake, and bald eagles!

July 10 work in progress

It's icky here. Only got to 99 today but I think that's just because the smoke was so thick that not much sun is getting through. It's bad. My head hurts, my throat hurts. There are no fires here, it's just blowing in.

Here's how the back yard looked this afternoon, I took this around 2:30pm. Nuthin but gray skies do I see....

This evening if you didn't know it was smoke you might think it was overcast and about to rain. Weird.

No stars tonight, and the moon is an interesting shade of reddish orange (for those who need to know, shutter speed 1/3 second, focal length 400mm, used tripod and timer, photo is cropped):

WIP:


So I have at least four people threatening to put my profile online if I don't do it myself, ahem. I will, I am getting there, soon.... Guess it's time to find out if the cosmos can prove me wrong... ;-) I AM rather curious what other people would post about me though, eep!

The Adventure: June 27: Yellowstone: thermals and geysers

We stayed in West Yellowstone, MT the night of the 26th so as to save some gas and get an early start the next day. Cute place, I recommend the Hibernation Station if you need to stay there. A little spendy for sure but actually a LOT better than some of the generic hotels. Of course being afflicted with the "can't sleep in hotels" curse, I think I was significantly less than perky the next morning. Sorry... And it was B's birthday no less!

The morning started out with a lot of hot springs. I'm not exactly sure what this first one is. Looking at the map I am guessing Terrace Hot Springs, but I didn't make a note of it at the time. These thermal areas are all over the place up there, I had no idea how many there were! Some of them have little trails and overlooks and whatnot for the tourists but I wonder if the ones that are off the beaten path are just left as is? Probably. They post lots of signs warning people not to do stupid things like, you know, jump in them. Hey, survival of the fittest. That goes for petting bison too. Some kid got tossed around while we were up there because he was posing a few feet away from a bison. I mean hello! Anyway, I digress. Here are some thermal pools:


And then we stopped at Norris Geyser Basin, which has LOTS and lots of pools and geysers and steam and sulfur and all that fun stuff. It's so prehistoric looking, just amazing.






I don't know the names of all the specific geysers, but I do remember this one is Steamboat Geyser.


And this is some water flowing over interesting looking mineral (?) deposits. Edit! If you don't read the comments, B clarified the nifty colors for me. Yeah, I guess I do remember reading that: "All of those colors that the water is running over are micro organisms. All of the different colors have a specific heat range in which they live and have different basis for life; the green ones deriving their energy and color from chlorophyl and living in the "cooler" temperatures, and the reddish ones get their energy and color from iron and live in the relatively "hotter" temperatures." Thanks. :-)

Lots of interesting colors in a place like this. Don't you think there ought to be a pterodactyl flying around there?



Next up: you guessed it, more Yellowstone! Including some big ole elk!

July 9 work in progress and other ramblings

Some WIPS do not photograph well. These are among them, but lest you think I've been sitting around twiddling my thumbs, I must show them to you (okay, so I've been spending great gobs of time getting all the Adventure photos cropped and labeled, but I'm almost done with those, which is sad because once I finish blogging it then you're stuck with my relatively dull existence again).

Anyway. BM's illustrated mat boards. The big one is done, the smaller one is in progress.

Turkeys, a broiler, and some wysteria, all of which is symbolic and important to BM.

Feathers, assorted colors, nowhere near done.


I framed "Jessie" today. The drawing, not the real live arthritic deaf dog. I like! I shudder to think how much it's going to cost me to frame "Thankful" (the almost life size horse head portrait). Gulp! Frame prices have sure gone up in the last ten years.

Now riddle me this, chicken people. What is this?! This bird had struck me as odd all along but it wasn't until a couple days ago that I really had a good look at it and realized that's REALLY weird. I'd just been thinking it was a birchen-ish color, but it's totally not! It's from the Golden Duckwing breeding pen.

Here's a normal colored male. Note that males have the pointed neck and saddle feathers, bigger comb, etc.

Here's a normal colored female, note stippled gray body and rounded feathers.

Here's "it." Feathers and comb say female. Color leans more toward male. Females don't have the solid "wing bay" (the cream colored patch on the wing). A birchen female would be more or less solid black with a silver neck. REJ, do you still read this??

The Adventure: June 26: Yellowstone: more bison and elk

We left Old Faithful and drove toward West Yellowstone (that's an actual town btw, its in Montana, yay I went to Montana!). Somewhere along that stretch of road we missed the bear. Oodles of cars pulled over along the river, so we jumped out and ran up there and people said "you just missed the bear." Dang! Probably a big gorgeous photogenic bear, knowing my luck. Oh well, I did enjoy the bison at Old Faithful. You win some, you lose some.

Onward we went, the sun was setting (oh, it stays light a lot later there). We stopped to take photos at a field full of bison and their calves. A lot of these pics came out blurry as it was so dark outside. I thought it was interesting that these bison were not nearly as shedded out as the two we'd seen earlier in the day.

Yes, a tripod would have been nice, but my luggage was stuffed to the gills with all the other stuff I brought along. Maybe next time. :-)




And then another field of bison.

And then two elk cows out in a field. The light was nearly gone, so all but a few of these came out blurry. Oh well, still useable to me as reference for shape and movement.



Next up: Day two in Yellowstone!

the way things go sometimes

Hmmm.

It looks as though my Coolpix camera might be dying. At least parts of it. It acted a little odd for me once on the trip (froze up) but I didn't think much of it, that happens sometimes. But now the flash won't fire. And if the flash won't fire when it needs to then the camera won't focus because instead it's saying "I'm charging the flash, hang on!" only the flash doesn't really charge, so at the moment I can only shoot pics in which I can turn the flash off. *sigh* Great. Just because I have a monster camera now doesn't mean I wasn't planning on using this one for certain things. I'm going to have to look into getting that fixed versus buying a new "one-handed" camera at some point in the future (NOT now). I do need a little camera.

And then there seems to be no hot water today. Hmm. That's not good. Luckily I didn't get too skanky today (it was 110, I stayed in!) and it was a lovely night for a moonlit swim. So much for washing the dishes!

I've been seeing a pair of bluebirds around, and today I saw 10 fledglings in the yard. Wow. I guess they must have nested in one of the boxes in the pasture. But 10 babies?! Jeez.

The barn swallows fledged on Saturday and Sunday.

I have a REALLY weird looking chicken I need to photograph for my chicken buddies. It's just so dang hot while it's light outside! The feather colors are those of a male, the feather type is that of a female. Huh??

The Adventure: June 26: Yellowstone: Old Faithful

It was evening when we arrived at Old Faithful. There was a smallish crowd starting to gather. We had no idea when it was going to do its thing and couldn't find a sign anyway so we figured that meant time to go get ice cream cones and wander back out there. Perfect timing. The crowd got bigger and I could hear people saying it would go off in a few minutes.

And then I heard people exclaiming about a bison! Huh? Sure enough, what should come wandering up but a lovely big bison!

Oh this was perfect! Good lighting, he was really close, and all I had to do was sit there and take photos while he turned this way and that. What a guy, perfect reference animal, I thank him for that. And eventually he wandered right into the frame of the photo with Old Faithful going off! Seriously, it doesn't get any more awesome than that. We sure got there at the right time. :-)

Old Faithful not doing much yet:

Look at him, he's great! The urge to bust out a curry comb and fix up that hairdo is hard to resist, but I'm sure he wouldn't take kindly to that.

Me with the bison.

Any second...

There it goes! Whoosh! It lasts a few minutes, I didn't know it went on so long!






Bryan with the bison, on the wrong side the danger sign uh oh!


Hey look, an animal scratching itself!

Us with the bison, too bad it wasn't just a little closer or it would look like it's on B's head. :-)

I'm not sure why I like this photo so much, but I do!


Truly, there could be no better way to witness Old Faithful, that bison just made it extra super duper.

Next up, more bison and elk on the way out!